How did you even do that?
It’s no surprise that people often steal things from hotel rooms—they can’t just leave a nice pen around and expect you not to want to take it home. But how bold do people actually get when thieving hotel room items before leaving? A new study from Wellness Heaven, a luxury and spa hotel guide that reviews hotels in Europe and Asia, reports that they get pretty brazen.
According to the study, in which 1,157 hoteliers were surveyed (634 from 4-star hotels and 523 from 5-star hotels), the top three items stolen from hotel rooms are, in order: towels, bathrobes, and hangers. Just underneath those, pens and cutlery were the next most sought-after items by thieves. But once you got beyond these more standard items, things took a turn for the weird.
Somehow, “artworks” and mattress bedding rounded out the top ten items stolen out of 4- and 5-star hotel rooms, according to this survey. Pretty brazen and illegal, but at least those things can fit inside a suitcase. The strangest stolen goods are completely out of control, however–we’re talking bathroom fittings (showerheads, a toilet seat), room numbers, stuffed hunting trophies (how?), and at a hotel near Salzburg in Austria, full sauna benches from the terrace of a spa suite.
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The most asinine thievery, however, took place at a hotel in Italy, where a hotelier walked through the lobby and noticed something extremely large was missing—a whole grand piano. Apparently, three men just walked in and wheeled it out. The piano was never seen again.
So, as you can imagine, we have several questions for these thieving guests.
Do You Think You Don’t Exist?
When you check out of the hotel, are you under the impression that you have stopped existing and have no identity? You’ve been away from your home for a few days and perhaps feel like a renegade who no one knows around these parts (and will never see again upon your departure), but that doesn’t mean the hotel doesn’t know exactly who you are. They have your credit card on file, most likely, and it is on record that you (definitely you, they have your first and last name) stayed in exactly that room on those days—so it’s pretty easy to figure out who did the crime. They will know you stole the bedding off the bed in your room!
What Are You Going to Do With That?
Really, though, what are you going to do with that whole sauna bench stolen from a hotel spa? Put it in your house? Steal other parts of other saunas to complete your new, stolen home sauna?
Do You Feel Even a Little Silly Removing the Seat From a Hotel Toilet?
Does this make you feel at all… a little dumb? It does, right? You’re not taking a seat from a hotel toilet and thinking, “This is normal and good, I am smart for doing this”–right? You’re not, right? You feel a little dumb while doing this. You’ve got to. You are human, right?
Where Are You Going With That Grand Piano?
It’s one thing to steal a bathrobe, which can be rolled up and made small, but stealing a full grand piano from a hotel is in a whole different league. Literally, where are you going with that? Did you forget how big pianos are? Are you planning on selling the stolen grand piano (is there a black market for grand pianos?) or are you a classically trained pianist down on their luck and suddenly without a piano and with absolutely nothing to lose? It takes so much effort to move a piano! What in the world is your endgame here?
And Finally, a Note on Stealing Hotel Blankets: That’s Gross
Okay, not all of them are disgusting, but we’ve all heard the horror stories. I don’t care how luxurious and expensive it is, a lot of people have slept in it and that thought alone can’t be laundered away. You want to own the sheets that hundreds of other people rubbed all over their bodies?
Look, hotel thieves—you’re not fooling anyone. The most likely conclusion to your heist is that you’ll get home, check your credit card statement, and notice the hotel just went ahead and charged you for your smuggled-out goods. Which, in the long run, just makes all of this the most roundabout way to purchase a used souvenir.